What's the fuss about "too literary"?

[Bluma Bezbroda]

This is a question primarly targeted towards connoirsseurs of genred literature. Few times already I encountered questions here, on Litopia, whether too much "literary bent" is appropriate in this context- I remember @Richard Turner 's thread on literary thrillers and recently @Marc Joan and @Charles Allen discussed it in the context of sci-fi and fantasy. My question, as a lay person, is- is it really so bad?

I don't read any of the afoementioned genres a lot, not because I hate dungeons & dragons, or don't appreciate the thrill of a mystery, but because (and maybe I will make a few enemies saying that ) usually there is not much more there.

I had the pleasure to talk about it with two friends who are big enhusiasts of fantasy genre and they both told me that readers expect good plot and a lot of fighting sceenes, and anything more would make them bored. That is perfectly fine by me, but would something more be necessarily be a bad thing? How about introducing some psychology? Sociological/political commentary? What if, lets say, the hero(s) would take off on a quest, but instead of saving the world they would come back home completely traumatised, with the knowledge that they were fighting the wrong enemy all along? Thoughts?

(And of course I'm NOT asking because I have an idea for a fantasy book )

 

[Marc Joan]

You've probably already gathered that I think putting literary into genre is a good thing. I'm not alone; as Brian Clegg said somewhere, there are great examples of this meld -- but, as he also said, once that happens they are no longer deemed to be of whatever genre they were, they are now 'literary'. It matters, because once you start mixing it up like this, you make your work more difficult to market. It might be easier with a lit-scifi novel, as there are some good existing examples of such work in that form, but nobody wants a lit-scifi short story.

 

[Paul Whybrow]

Your question had me wondering if there was a computer algorithm to distinguish between 'literary' and 'genre' novels.

It's not quite there, but three linguists came up with a way of analysing common factors of successful books. Apparently, novelists should write more like journalists to achieve sales—by using more nouns, pronouns and prepositions.

Computer Algorithm Seeks To Crack Code Of Fiction Bestsellers

Science is all very well, but I agree with author Rob Hansen's opinion, given at the end of the article:

"Most people buy and read books because they're captured by the topic."

 

[Carol Rose]

**Disclaimer** This post isn't directed at any one person. It's a general post on the subject.

Here's the bottom line. No matter what you call it, and no matter how badly you want to write it and believe it's a fabulous idea, if it didn't sell because no one else thought it was a fabulous idea, it still didn't sell.

The genre labels are only there for readers. Yes, I know we say they're there for agents and publishers, but agents and publishers want/need them for READERS. And they're fluid, depending on where you live and the publisher's definition of the content of said label. There's no concrete consistency in most of those labels, as we've seen in countless discussions of genres and sub-genres, right here on this forum.

Get as close as you can to the publisher or agent you're targeting. See what else they rep or publish to get an idea of how they define the content behind those labels. It's painstaking work, but it's the best you can do at times, since they do differ from place to place.

As to the question of mixing it up within a genre, and adding elements that readers don't expect or want, that's all well and good but again ... be careful. If you're not giving them what they expect to get or what they want, why would you expect them to want to read it? If your goal is to SELL the book, sometimes (usually) you have to play the game by the current rules.

 

[Bluma Bezbroda]

I think Carol sort of expressed what I was wondering about. I don't believe that agents/publishers accept stories because they like them, but because they think the readers (which are costumers in this case) will want them. They want to deliver a product that the costumers will buy and consume. And that means that there has to be some quantifiable parameter(s) of what people expect. It is hard for me to understand, cause I generally buy books having expectations beforehand. I'm more like opening up my arms and saying "Amaze me".

But lets say that you do follow the general, expected requirements of the genre and add literary components that we are talking about. It's not a question whether it's possible- I know it is- but if it would be a problem for the readers. Would they find it boring/distracting/unnecessary? Because that's where the trouble might be.

 

[Chase Gamwell]

@Carol Rose I wish I could give you a "Love" and "Winner" too!

@Bluma Bezbroda I think you're right when you mention that the reader might be part of the problem when trying to craft a literary work. When I think about literary science fiction (and I may be thinking about it completely wrong, so forgive me if I botch this), it seems to me that much of that type of offering is behind us. While I have seen some recently, it seems to me that most markets are shifting towards offerings that are less literary and more blockbuster. Consumers of media nowadays don't seem to want movies/games/television/books that reach for something deeper - that explore the human condition. And that's kind of where we get back to what Carol Rose was saying. Whether the story being written is fantastic or not, it all comes down to what the readers want and whether the story can be sold to an audience. And when looking at what is widely consumed today, literary anything doesn't really seem to be on the list. It's totally likely that I'm completely off base with this, but that's just how it feels at the moment...

 

[Bluma Bezbroda]

No Chase, I agree with you- we are going towards simplification and/or sensationalism in every field (you may not believe it but it's happening in science right now). Interesting what you mentioned about deeper contents being the thing of the past. It made me think of Ursula le Guin and her fantastic books. Yet... Ursula K. Le Guin: A Rejection Letter

So I guess one has to make a decision, whether they want to have a big and fast monetary success, or to listen to your heart and hope to get lucky

 

[Bluma Bezbroda]

On the other hand, I wonder if Dan Brown or his ilk started by sitting down and thinking "Yeah, I will give them such a corker, with a lot of tits and explosions, bitches will eat from my hands"

 

[Chase Gamwell]

((It's funny that you mention Ursula K. Le Guin. I grew up reading her, Marion Zimmer Bradley, Andre Norton, Issac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, etc. Many of these scifi/fantasy writers had plenty of action in their books, but the stories being told focused on the human condition. The action was just a consequence of character decisions. My writing of scifi is informed by these authors and I like to think that I'm better at crafting stories because I read them...))

I think it all comes down to what each of us wants. Regardless of what happens, we are all writers. Of course, whether we get published or not is another matter entirely, but that is dependent on whether we are producing stories that feed into the current meta. If agents/editors/publishers want YA and we aren't writing that, then we probably aren't going to get published. And, honestly, that IS the curse of going the traditional route of publishing. To quote you, we do have a decision to make - "whether [we] want to have a big and fast monetary success, or to listen to [our] heart and hope to get lucky." To most writers, this is going to be a pretty simple decision to make. I write for the sake of writing, so I'll be following my heart. If that means many of my stories won't see print, then so be it.

Also, that last comment had me rollin'...

 

[Carol Rose]

If I could figure out what the &^^%%^&U* readers WANT, I wouldn't have to work my day job. Just sayin...

 

[Charles Allen]

Well the first example that springs to mind when questioning fantasy's role to play in a literary bent, and this is going beyond the simple swords and magic and wenches 'n' stuff, is the author Robin Hobb. She happens to be my favourite author as well but the quests she writes almost never end well. She's rather like George R. R. Martin in that respect, where her main characters are constantly defecated upon by nasty villains and people you just want to kill. But there's so much more to it. Her first trilogy, The Farseer Trilogy, deals with issues such as loneliness, depression, costs of murder, psychological repercussions of betrayal, tragedy, violence on children and how they deal with it, emotional manipulation. These are just a few that are tightly woven together and all have a very real impact on current issues, and this is just her first trilogy